Department of Justice

HAMMOND- Deshalon France, 30, of East Chicago, Indiana, was sentenced by United States District Court Judge Philip P. Simon after pleading guilty to being a felon in possession of a firearm, announced United States Attorney Clifford D. Johnson.

France was sentenced to 57 months in prison followed by 1 year of supervised release. 

According to documents in the case, on November 4, 2020, France was stopped by the East Chicago Police Department during an investigation of shots fired in the area.  At the time, France possessed a stolen nine-millimeter, semi-automatic pistol loaded with thirty-three rounds of ammunition in an extended magazine.  France had previously been convicted of the felony offenses of fraud and attempted trafficking of contraband in a penal institution.  In addition, his criminal history revealed that he had two prior misdemeanor convictions for carrying a handgun without a license and three prior misdemeanor convictions for resisting law enforcement.         

This case was investigated by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, the Indiana HIDTA Task Force, and the East Chicago Police Department.  This case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Thomas R. Mahoney.    

This case was prosecuted as part of the joint federal, state, and local Project Safe Neighborhoods (PSN) Program, the centerpiece of the Department of Justice’s violent crime reduction efforts.  PSN is an evidence-based program proven to be effective at reducing violent crime.  Through PSN, a broad spectrum of stakeholders work together to identify the most pressing violent crime problems in the community and develop comprehensive solutions to address them.  As part of this strategy, PSN focuses enforcement efforts on the most violent offenders and partners with locally based prevention and reentry programs for lasting reductions in crime.